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DexterSinister #211 09/01/2011 - 20h45

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Hey all.  Just put together my Freetrack system and got it working well.  Now I need to refine it.  Here's my webcam experiences:

My first try was with an unmodified Logitech C510 and plain old red LEDs from Radioshack powered by an old bike light.  After tweaking the cam settings, it worked well in a dimly lit room. Worked pretty good even with the lights on, but no direct sun.

I tried a Microsoft Lifecam VX-3000, but the glass IR filter is stuck over the CCD and although others appear to have removed it without damaging the CCD, I killed the cam when I busted it out.  I took apart a VX-5000, but abandoned the idea of using it when I saw the same glass IR filter assembly.

Got some IR LEDs and finally got a Logitech C200 It works well and is easy to disassemble.  Stuck a piece of floppy disk over the front for IR filter.  Got mine for $20 on sale at Target.

So; excepting the cam I busted for $25 and the extra LEDs I purchased, I built mine for under $30 and a few hours time.  (I already had wire, soldering iron, and old bike light lying around).  And it was a fun project, too.  ...oh, and I guess I'm going to drop a few bucks on a more permanent hat that I want to use.

The point being, if you are halfway handy, follow the advice of others here,  and have the basics around, it's a pretty easy project
Vink #212 09/01/2011 - 22h51

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Best solution is PS3 eye!!! Awesome results indeed! Only 30$ brand new!

up to 125 fps!, 75 degrees of nondistortional view! Sensitive and respositive. Catch and holds tightly my LEDs powered only with 20 mA current wit no jitter!!!


Comparing to Wii remote control, PS3 camera  is cheaper, it is faster and has very wide view,  it is easy to install and use!! I guess, It outperforms original TrackIR!



Look latest findings and results: http://forum.free-track.net/index.php?showtopic=2416


Really satisfied with results. Wish you all the same
Edited by Vink on 11/01/2011 at 00h33.
fael097 #213 27/01/2011 - 22h52

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great, i tried to remove the IR filter of my microsoft lifecam, and ruined it. thanks freetrack for your brilliant suggestions
Gallow24 #214 02/02/2011 - 13h38

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Hi,

will it work with this one?:
http://www.amazon.de/Your-Shape-inkl-Motion-Tracking-Kamera/dp/B002MWSY3E/ref=lh_ni_t_t5


How many fps this cam has?

Or what is the best solution?
Shadow #215 04/02/2011 - 22h06

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Microsoft VX2000: Dont buy it. Is perfect for chating but not for Freetrack. It has very high delay (low resposiviness).

Logiteck C160: Very good and cheap camera for freetrack but a little delay too.
Good tracking without remove of IR filter and without negative film. See video demo here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlDjVLyqphc
Also has I420 color space too, so is great choice for Falcon 4 sims (openfalcon, freefalcon, falcon4af)
Video demo for openfalcon here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Grjf5jIxuxo&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

Konig CMP-WEBCAM21: GREAT-GREAT-GREAT camera for freetrack. Very cheap and good resposiviness - tracking, without remove of IR filter and without negative film in front of the camera.
You cannot play Falcon sims coz it has not I420 color space. (but you can try 2.1 version of freetrack. This version play well but is not so good as 2.2)
Video demo and settings here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EL2p9GU0IJ4
Edited by Shadow on 07/02/2011 at 04h04.
enriquefc #216 10/02/2011 - 15h51

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Hello Guys:

After a failed attempt with an old camera, I got my hands on a Genius I-look 300 camera that supposedly would not work (autoexposure). To my surprise, the camera's autoexposure feature can be shut down and exposure set manually up to +200. Thats very cool, considering I didnt even have to change the exposure for the camera to work properly.

I took out the IR filter in the camera, very easily by the way, and even without a floopy/negative filter the camera picks up my 3 IR LED's running at less than 1.5V on a single AA battery at half life (and my PC is next to a huge 12 foot window). Also, I can run it at higher resolutions of 800x600 (15fps 0 jitter) and 640x480 (30fps 10 jitter). At lower resolutions it runs fine at 30/0.

The only problem I have now is the point-system I made, which is butt-ugly and not very accurate, plus I think I will make the jitter smoother by learning about/changing the different settings in FT.

I started up Rise of Flight a couple of minutes after I set it up and it worked perfectly, albeit with some choppiness and misguided movements (due to the poor point cap), but even with that, I got 2 very quick kills in MP (Against very sharp-turning camels) with FT in like 5 minutes, that I had never done. Also, don't know if anyone else experiences this, but using it can make me queezy, like riding a roller-coaster or something, might be that I am not used to it.

So to summarize:

Genius I-Look 300.
IR filter removal = Easy
No need for negative filter.
US$15 at amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Genius-i-Look-300-camera-color/dp/B001E2Z7RE
3 Point Cap system with IR LED's taken from Recycled RC Helicopter Control
About 3 feet from camera in high light conditions.
Some jitter.
Games Used so far: Rise of Flight, IL2, COD:MW2, COD:Black Ops.
Using Freetrack 2.1 Since I read that this camera "could work" with that version but not 2.2. BUT I HAVE NOT CONFIRMED THIS.

Great job and thank you so much for helping me save $149 on TrackIR... I can honestly say PC-Gaming will never be the same for me, this is too awesome.

Enrique.
Volans #217 20/02/2011 - 20h18

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PS3EYE POTENTIAL USERS BE AWARE!!!:

I recently buyed a PS3eye camera, and found a very nasty surprise:the lens are constructed now in a different way than the lens of the first series of the camera.
As a result the ir filter is now located BETWEEN the lenses, and NOT at one end (as shown in the tutorials video on the internet). The ir filter CAN NOT be removed unless destroying the lens assembly. Obviously, I refused to belive such a verdict, but sadly is the very truth (and I destroyed the lens assembly..;)). Be aware that 70 to 80% of the ps3eye cameras found now on the market are the "bad" ones, so one have to be really lucky to grab a "good" one.

It seems that the only exterior difference between them is the look of the front lens, according to this article:
http://peauproductions.blogspot.com/2009/04/two-types-of-ps3-eye-stock-lenses.html
AND:
http://nuigroup.com/forums/viewthread/10558/

But after all, ps3eye is almost perfect camera for freetrack, so i ordered a oem replacement lens from peau production (the "good" one).Alternate, one can replace the lens mount and install any webcam lens compatible.
Edited by Volans on 20/02/2011 at 20h25.
a1adin #218 22/04/2011 - 07h55

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wero #219 09/08/2011 - 21h40

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have a question, will a microsoft Vx2000 work?? because I see both 3000 nd 1000 work but have no idea why no one posted about the 2000

thanks greets  :D  :D
wizardjoe #220 08/09/2011 - 22h25

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Hello all,

Anyone know if the HP Webcam 3110 is compatible with Freetrack or not?

- Lester
PropNut #221 28/09/2011 - 14h39

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Another PS3 Eye success. I did not need to remove the IR filter (I have the "bad" type anyway). I did put a piece of floppy disk as a filter over the lens and put the FOV to near (or closeup, whatever the terminology is). I get nice large red dots from about 3 feet away, and very good smaller dots from as far as 7 feet away. This is in a very well lighted room (ceiling track lighting) with shiny spots all over the place and large windows. I am using a custom 3-LED headphone clip (I made it is be the exact dimensions of the TrackIR Pro Clip so I could also use it with my TrackIR).

Once in a while the camera drivers seem to lose their settings and need to be reset (gain and contrast set to about middle and threshold set to middle) but this seems to only happen when I move the freetrack window to another monitor desktop. Not sure what is up with that.

So far out of the dozen or so Freetrack rigs that I have made for people the PS3 Eye has the best performance and smoothest tracking of any of them. For the first time I can confidently say that this freetrack rig is as good as my TrackIR5 rig.

640x480 @ 60pfs is the sweet spot.
KingmanRoss #222 06/11/2011 - 09h37

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I have a Logitech Webcam C160,with 1 led light on its top,and a nightlight on my desk to see my keyboard.Other than that,the only light is what comes from my monitor.Will this be ok? There are no other light sources,unless I play games during the day,but with my curtain drawn,but it is not that bright and is to my left,no direct light.
casualgamer #223 06/12/2011 - 18h34

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Hi!

I recently bought two Logitech HD webcam C310, since they were on sale.

I made a 3-point cap. IR diodes rated with 100 mA max, so I use 40mA through them. I also "roughed up" the lenses so they aren't clear anymore (I just filed them down a bit, so they are flatter but more diffuse).



My first try was simply to put a piece of an old floppy disk in front of the lens, and that pretty much worked, but not ideally perhaps.

For starters Freetrack would not work if I installed the Logitech webcam driver, so i uninstalled it. But then I only get 14-16 FPS, 0 JPS. I've tried all the options for resolutions but 16 FPS seems to be max.

It's a "HD" cam with a max res of 1280x720, but then I get like 5 FPS. I'm using half, 640x360. Using less doesn't seem to affect FPS by much if anything. Also it only supported YUY2 format , not MJPG.


So pretty much thats it so far. Not ideal, but it works. It's good for up to about 2 meters distance. But I sit closer than that, about 50cm I guess, so the dots are very visible. I do not have any other lightning in the background. But it works with ambient lighting in the room, and during daytime.



As for the second  camera, well I was stupid enough to try and remove the IR filter. It was located just above the CCD, and I thought I was careful to break it off. Appearantly not, the camera would not work afterwards. I even heated the PCB with a hot air solder station I have, thinking maybe some bad solder joints had come loose. I'm not too experienced with SMD and hot air soldering though.  Anyway, it still wouldn't work, except the audio still do, even after my abuse. It's just the video stream that is not present any longer.

I knew I should have listened to that old saying, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"... it WAS working almost as-is, just with the floppy disk material in front...


In short:

Logitech HD webcam C310
IR filter: Hard to remove (I broke mine), luckily it is weak enough to work anyway.
FPS: 16-ish
Incompatible webcam  driver (but Windows Vista seem to have one built-in that works).



I also got a Wiimote, but Freetrack won't work with it through the standard windows supplied bluetooth driver. I haven't tried changing bluetooth drivers, as the wiimote works with other programs as-is (glovePIE, for one).


I'm using Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit  on an AMD phenom II 3.4 GHz thing btw.
Edited by casualgamer on 06/12/2011 at 18h36.
Morden #224 09/12/2011 - 06h26

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PrPrO @ 08/06/2010 - 09h11 a dit:

Logitech QuickCam E2500 (Connect)
i finally got it working
+i have 28 - 29 FPS and 3 jitter
+AE is on 0
+antiflicker off
+set on I420
+and 352 x 288 and it works great
+it is aprox. 30USD
+IR filter easy to remove, there is already a guid
+works great even on daylight




How did you manage 28-29 FPS? My can only do ~16 FPS, and its a core i5 laptop :o

And I broke the IR filter upon removing...
jimbo #225 11/12/2011 - 00h58

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Hi,


I just wanted to test my 3 point clip setup(usb'd SFH485P's @ 65ma) with a cheap dollar store Keychain camera. It was the only camera I had (out of 4) that worked with win7 64.

Turns out it works so well I don't need to buy a ps3eye.

I did not need to remove ir filter or put daylight filter. only a special driver that comes with software to adjust camera settings.

This 5$ camera is a MR97310c, which is sold worldwide under these common names:

Crystal Digital
Dual Smart
Genesis Logic
Innovage Outdoor Sports Mini Digital Camera
L'espion Mini Spy Digital Camera
Mini Digital Camera
Philips Keychain Digital Camera
Vivitar mini digital camera
"And probably dozens more."

(http://www.camerahacker.com/Forums/DisplayComments.php?file=Digital%20Camera/Vivitar/Anyone_seen_the__Vivitar_Mini_Digital_Camera.)

The drivers windows installed automatically made it work but had no way to disable autoexposure, even disabling it from the registry didn't work.

Specific color gain control and a couple of other useful features do work when you edit them in the registry (look under HKLM/SOFTWARE/MARS or something like that)

So I found a driver that disables autoexposure and a manual overide.

MR97310c Mini Digital Camera Drivers Version 2.03 All Functions work.zip (1.5 Mb)

To work, the driver needs to be installed, uninstalled (device properties of camera), and reinstalled using the setup.exe that comes with it.(dont ask thats how i got it to work). Sprinkle in a couple of restarts in there.

With an exposure setting of 6, in full daylight with lights on, I could only see the 3 dots of the clip. With full 24 fps. Freetrack says it can boost fps to 96 or something but anyway it's really smooth in Arma2.

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